Orla Mining Hires Silvana Costa as Chief Sustainability Officer: 5 Things to Know

Orla Mining has hired Silvana Costa as chief sustainability officer. She will join the Canada-based gold and silver mining company on January 13, 2025.

Costa succeeds Chafika Eddine, who left the company to "pursue her doctoral studies and further her passion for advancing sustainability at a global level," Orla said.

Here are five things to know about Orla Mining's business and sustainability strategy, and Costa's executive experience.

1. Business Scope and Scale: Orla Mining, founded in 2007, is based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The company has 158 employees listed on LinkedIn as of December 2024, but overall headcount involves 615 employees (both direct and indirect, across all mine sites and corporate), according to the firm's 2023 Sustainability Report. Orla operates mineral properties in Mexico and Nevada, United States. The company also is acquiring a mine in Ontario, Canada. Revenue for Q3 of 2024 was $99.3 million, up from $60.3 million in Q3 of 2023.

2. Sustainability Strategy: Orla Mining in 2022 launched a Towards 2030 Sustainability Strategy, which "amplifies our commitment to being a responsible, sustainability driven company, and charts a long-term roadmap for our ESG ambitions," according to the 2023 Sustainability Report. We don't know if the company has set a specific Net Zero deadline goal.

3. Chief Sustainability Role: Silvana Costa will have "executive level responsibility for Orla’s Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) efforts, in addition to guiding the Company’s internal and external stakeholder relationships," the company said.

4. Executive Experience: Costa has more than 20 years of experience across the mining industry, Orla said. She most recently was director of social performance, reporting to the CSO, at Teck Resources Ltd. Earlier, he held key roles at Equinix Gold Corp., First Majestic Silver Corp., and New Gold Inc., among other career experiences.

5. Executive Perspectives: In a prepared statement, Orla President and CEO Jason Simpson said: “We are pleased that Silvana has chosen to join the Orla team to continue and expand the work begun by Chafika to deliver positive benefits to all our stakeholders. I would like to thank Chafika for her contributions to Orla in establishing our Toward 2030 Sustainability Strategy and publishing our inaugural Sustainability Report in 2023, which were fundamental in laying the groundwork for our sustainability efforts."

Chief Sustainability Officers: Why Technology Partners Should Care

By 2027, 25% of Global 2000 companies will have assigned a chief sustainability officer (CSO) responsible for meeting their organization’s ESG goals and making ESG-related IT purchasing decisions, according to IDC.

The bottom line: Technology partners need to extend their sales, marketing, engagement and support strategies to successfully fulfill those CSO customer needs, Sustainable Tech Partner believes.